


what's behind and what's before

by grim_lupine



Category: Kingsman (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Gender Changes, Canonical Character Death, F/F, F/M, Hurt/Comfort, Porn with Feelings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-21
Updated: 2017-08-21
Packaged: 2018-12-18 08:21:46
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,610
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11870373
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/grim_lupine/pseuds/grim_lupine
Summary: Three steps toward living.





	what's behind and what's before

**Author's Note:**

> title from "after the storm" by mumford and sons 
> 
> thanks to pageleaf for looking this over <3333

Eggsy is limping and bruised when the night is over, exhausted to her bones, yet strangely steeped in jubilation. _What’ve you got to say to me now?_ she mentally tells all the naysayers before her, cocksure swagger in the roll of her hips. 

If Eggsy thinks of the one she hadn't got the chance to silence, she will fall apart as brittle as dry leaves; and so she doesn't, only thinks of the things she’s done tonight, and swings back around to Princess Tilde’s cell for the last of it. 

“Ready to get out of here?” she says after rapping a sharp _one-two-three_ with her knuckles, and opens the door with the code Merlin feeds her. 

Tilde is already on her feet as Eggsy takes a step inside her cell. The tip of her head is evaluative, nakedly interested. Eggsy hasn't been eyed that thoroughly in a while.

“Or we could stay a bit longer,” Tilde says archly, closing the distance between them on bare feet. She looms comfortably over Eggsy, nearly a head taller than her; oh, Eggsy likes that in a woman. “Celebrate?” 

Eggsy blinks, then slowly starts to grin.

In her ear, Merlin chuckles quietly, the exhaustion in his voice warmed through with amusement. 

“Go on, lass,” he says. “Tristan’s picking up Lancelot. Just remember to turn your bloody glasses off.” 

“Cheers, Merlin,” Eggsy says, the words rolling out her throat in a near-purr. She's still riding the high of saving the fucking world, a burbling manic edge in her blood, in her quivering hands. She stands triumphant on top of the world; on top of a wall, on one side the joyous adrenaline rush of heroics, on the other — 

Eggsy drags herself away from that precipice by the skin of her teeth.

“Celebrating sounds just fine with me,” Eggsy says, undoing the top two buttons of her shirt and tugging at the open collar so she can breathe. The cell door swings shut behind her. 

Eggsy lets Tilde turn her by the shoulders and back her up slowly toward the bed, tosses her glasses on the mattress when she gets there. The jacket falls to the floor. A voice in Eggsy’s head tells her to put it away somewhere; she neatly ignores it. 

Kissing a princess is an educating experience — gratifyingly forceful, and surprisingly dirty. Tilde’s hands slide into Eggsy’s hair but don't tug until Eggsy rolls her head against them, wordlessly telling her she can. When she does pull, a sharp tight fistful against Eggsy's skull, Eggsy groans and bows forward into the curve of Tilde’s body, mouth falling open for Tilde’s onslaught. 

Tilde rakes Eggsy’s lower lip to tenderness when she draws away from her, and puts her damp open mouth to Eggsy’s ear. 

“What is your name?” Tilde asks mildly. 

Eggsy freezes, then drops her head against Tilde’s shoulder and starts laughing. “Fuck, I never — sorry, love,” she says, still choking down her incredulous snickering, because this is her life now, apparently. “It's Eggsy. My name’s Eggsy.” 

“It suits you,” Tilde says decisively, then takes a step back, tipping Eggsy’s head up to see her face. She seems to like the way Eggsy has to angle herself to meet her eyes, if the way she straightens herself impossibly taller is any indication. “Eggsy,” Tilde says, voice dropping into a throaty register that makes Eggsy prickle with want. “Will you like it if I hold you down?”

“I might,” Eggsy says when that hits her, bites her lower lip coy and wicked as she slips her shirt off and goes for the button of her trousers. “But I won't make it easy on you.” 

_Someone's_ taught Sweden’s crown princess how to throw a body, Eggsy thinks as her back hits the mattress. It's no fair fight, of course, with Eggsy’s training; but then, it's not about _fighting_. It's about struggling for the fun of it, Tilde’s taut thighs snaking between Eggsy’s as they grapple for the upper hand. Eggsy kicks out of her trousers and underwear and bides her time as Tilde speedily undresses, then strikes: Tilde lets out a giggling _oof_ when Eggsy flips her onto her back, a lush stretch of curves and creamy skin Eggsy’s dying to get her mouth on. 

Tilde’s breast fills the cup of Eggsy’s hand, heavy and hot. Eggsy rubs her calloused thumb over Tilde’s nipple until it peaks, a taut strawberry pink. Eggsy closes her mouth around the nub of it and sucks, her hands sliding down the bumps of Tilde’s ribs and folding together under the sweat-damp curve of Tilde’s lower back, already arching up. Eggsy pulls her up firmly into the press of Eggsy’s body, kissing her way down between Tilde’s breasts, waiting, waiting — 

Tilde hooks her ankle around Eggsy’s legs and flips them back over, pushing Eggsy’s arms up above her head and pressing them into the bed at the wrists. 

Eggsy struggles, but not very hard; she doesn’t want to get away, doesn't _really_ want to be held so tight she can't. What she wants is to give herself over, for the moment, and know that she'll be caught.

“You got plans for me now?” Eggsy says, lifting her chin and grinning up at Tilde, the blood pumping fiercely in her veins. 

“I think I will make you come with my mouth,” Tilde says decisively, and leans her weight harder on Eggsy’s wrists as she bends to steal a kiss from her smiling mouth. 

Tilde is as good as her word; under her mouth, Eggsy flushes wet and aching, pulse pounding between her legs. She leaves her arms where they are but has to fist her hands in the sheets again and again to let out the urge to _move_ ; Tilde has her thighs caught in place so she can't go anywhere but rock minutely against Tilde’s mouth. 

She comes once on Tilde’s unrelenting tongue, tightening up from head to toe, still quivering and clenching from it when Tilde slides two fingers inside her. 

“ _Fuck_ ,” Eggsy says to the ceiling, turns her head to the side so she can bury it in her arm. 

“Again?” Tilde asks, watching her carefully as she rocks her palm firmly against Eggsy’s swollen clit. 

“Yeah — c’mon — ” Eggsy pants, crying out as Tilde works her to another orgasm, toes curling. Her cunt is swollen and sensitive and parts from Tilde’s palm with a wet sucking noise that nearly makes her blush, gets her mouth watering instead. 

Tilde leaves a wet handprint on Eggsy’s stomach when she kisses Eggsy’s mouth open, her hair falling around them and trailing teasingly against Eggsy’s skin. 

“What do you want?” Eggsy murmurs between kisses, running her hand up and down Tilde’s smooth back. “Just tell me.” 

“Your fingers,” Tilde says without hesitation; and “another,” she says when Eggsy has two curling inside her; and “I want it _hard_ ,” until Eggsy’s hand is near-cramping and her fingers are pruny-wet and she _loves_ it. Eggsy’s always had clever hands, but this might be the best reward she's gotten for them yet.

Tilde is beautiful and loud when she comes, uninhibited. She grabs Eggsy’s upper arm and leaves half-moon indents in her bicep, the stinging pain of it only making her feel triumphant, more alive. 

After, Tilde sinks back onto the bed loose-limbed and draws Eggsy down by her side. Eggsy puts her head down on Tilde’s shoulder and waits for the trembling of her own limbs to subside. Several minutes later, she is still waiting, eyes screwed shut and breathing fast through her open mouth. 

Tilde cements her clear-eyed perceptiveness in Eggsy’s mind by not asking, just stroking her fingers through Eggsy’s hair and tightening her half-embrace. Eggsy tries to focus on the sound of her breathing, the thump of her heartbeat, stop hearing — 

All the gunshots Eggsy’s witnessed tonight: there's just one still ringing in her ears. 

“Sorry,” Eggsy says hoarsely, when her dry mouth finds words again, a little awkward. “You ain't been having a picnic in here either.”

Tilde says nothing for a long moment, then: “No,” she agrees, “But now I'm going home.” She half-covers Eggsy’s eyes with her hand like she knows Eggsy can have this conversation better not looking at her. “You're welcome to come with me, you know. I won't let anyone bother you for as long as you like.”

Eggsy’s throat goes absurdly tight. She coughs past it and says, “Love, that's the nicest offer I've had in a while, but — I can't.” 

Tilde pats Eggsy’s face and removes her hand. “More saving the world?” she says, a smile in her voice. 

“Mmm, and princesses to kiss, you know how it is,” Eggsy says, and turns further into the curve of Tilde’s body, hiding her faint grin in the warm curtain of Tilde’s hair. 

There’s work to do, and Eggsy’s up for the task; but it'll be there tonight, and tomorrow, and the days after that. She can give herself this for just a little longer. 

 

*

 

The first few days, there’s too much cleanup work keeping her running for Eggsy to do anything but fall into bed each night, exhausted to the bone, out as soon as her head hits the pillow. When that ceases to be distraction enough, Eggsy gives in and takes a bottle of gin to bed with her, tries to sleep under its warm haze and the distant prickling memory of a low voice telling her how to sip and appreciate it. She thinks it might help, but instead finds herself swimming through incoherent nightmares, terrifying in the moments of real memory that shine through, like broken glass catching light. 

Eggsy wakes with her mouth dry and her heart pounding, hates it; anyway, drinking alone isn't a habit she really wants to form.

The next time Eggsy feels her hands start shaking and _knows_ she won’t be sleeping tonight, Roxy is thankfully back in the country, and looks as drawn as Eggsy feels. 

“Want to get a drink?” Eggsy asks, throwing her arm around Roxy’s shoulders.

“God, yes,” Roxy says; Eggsy is suddenly, fiercely thankful that they know each other enough now for Roxy to let Eggsy see the vulnerability in her faint, tired smile. 

They find a quiet little pub where they can disappear into a booth and have a pint in silence; as fun as it is sometimes to hit a club and watch Roxy warn off admirers with cool, fathomless eyes, they’re neither of them in the mood for it tonight. 

They’ve been there long enough that Eggsy is comfortably tipsy when she licks a splash of grease off her thumb, and looks up to see Roxy’s eyes on her mouth in a way she couldn’t misinterpret if she were half-dead. 

Roxy’s eyes flick up, meet Eggsy’s. 

Eggsy inhales, and then lets her mouth curve into a grin. 

To say anything would break the spell of certainty that blankets them: in the morning, doubt-tinged, this might feel like a bad idea; but for now it is something they _want_ , and Eggsy intends to have.

She follows Roxy home in silence, shadowing her through the front door so closely she’s likely breathing hot down her neck. Another time, she might have expected to be pinned against the door the moment it was closed; tonight, it feels right to flick on the lights and kiss Roxy in the middle of the room where she can see her, hands gently cupping her face, soft. 

Roxy puts her hand under Eggsy’s shirt and rubs slow, widening circles on Eggsy’s back, while Eggsy undoes Roxy’s braid and combs her hair out into loose, sweetly scented waves she wants to bury her face in. Roxy drags her hand up further until Eggsy’s shirt is rucked up under her arms, and then helps Eggsy pull it off entirely. 

The slow-burning heat in Roxy’s eyes when she looks Eggsy over makes her shiver; makes her, for a moment, want to say something glib and cut through the quiet, but she bites her tongue and refrains. 

“Upstairs,” Roxy says, and leads Eggsy there by the hand. 

There is one thing Eggsy has wanted since she realized they were getting here, and for longer, perhaps; it consumes her now, her back prickling with a wash of heat, mouth watering fiercely.

“I want — ” Eggsy says; lets her hands complete the words, pushing Roxy down to sit on the edge of the bed so Eggsy can get on her knees. 

“Oh,” Roxy murmurs, a hot exhalation that makes Eggsy want to arch her back, preening. Roxy leans back and lets Eggsy push her skirt up her thighs, spreading them so Eggsy can get between them and bend her head. She’s so hungry for it she can’t even wait to remove Roxy’s underwear, kisses her open-mouthed through the fabric, tongue delving into her slit. 

“ _Eggsy_ ,” Roxy says, oh, her name sounds so good in Roxy’s mouth. Eggsy grips Roxy’s thighs and pulls her closer, half-buried under Roxy’s skirt, dragging her tongue over her clit repeatedly until she can taste the tang of Roxy’s slick. Roxy comes near-silently, a shiver rolling through her body, thighs twitching under Eggsy’s hands. 

Eggsy sucks in a stuttering breath, resting her forehead on Roxy's thigh. Then she uncoils from her place on her knees and _lifts_ Roxy by the thighs, throwing her further up the bed. 

“At least get _naked_ first,” Roxy says with a laugh in her voice, when Eggsy puts a knee down on the bed.

“I will if you will,” Eggsy returns, lifting her eyebrows, hand on her waistband.

Roxy beats Eggsy to nudity by a fraction, and settles back down on the bed, hair mussed and pink in the cheeks. Catching Eggsy’s eye, she spreads her legs apart, feet flat on the bed, lips slowly curling into a wicked little smile. 

“Christ,” Eggsy says fervently; and then she has nothing to say at all, stoppering her mouth with the pink, slick folds of Roxy’s cunt. 

She loses track of time between Roxy’s beautiful thighs: just knows she's been down there long enough for Roxy to come again, twice, rolling her hips into it; for Eggsy’s jaw to start aching, her mouth flooded with the taste of Roxy’s arousal. Roxy’s hand has been fisted in Eggsy’s hair the whole time, a tight-knuckled grip that might as well have reached inside Eggsy herself; it's the most grounded she’s felt in _weeks_ , like Roxy’s hands are tethering her to the very earth, keeping her from splintering into a million pieces. 

If anyone is capable of it, it's Roxy. 

“Enough, I can't — ” Roxy says with a funny little gasp that makes arousal throb through Eggsy. She lifts her head, and watches Roxy’s eyes go impossibly hungrier at how wrecked she must look. 

Roxy drags Eggsy up by the arms, nearly knocking their foreheads together in her haste to kiss her; their lips slide together with how wet Eggsy’s mouth is, and she whines in the back of her throat when Roxy sucks the taste of herself off Eggsy’s lower lip, teasing Eggsy’s mouth open with her tongue to get more. 

Eggsy comes once riding Roxy’s thigh, and it barely takes the edge off — she needs Roxy’s dexterous fingers fucking her _hard_ to another wildfire orgasm before she'll let herself be gentled down, panting in short bursts as Roxy mouths shallow, nipping bruises on Eggsy’s shoulders and breasts. 

Slowly, Eggsy slumps forward: tangles her legs with Roxy’s, stretches out on the bed until her back cracks. She feels sated and _real_ , not the paper-thin facsimile of herself she's been of late. 

Roxy seems to crave the closeness as much as Eggsy does, even as sweat-sticky and warm as they are. Roxy turns her head until they can brush temples, and they lie like that in easy silence for a long moment.

“ _Not_ that this wasn’t fun,” Roxy says after a while, with arch enunciation, “but — we can do the cuddling bit without it, too. For future reference.”

Eggsy closes her eyes and smiles, winds her fingers through Roxy’s. “I will if you will,” she says. 

They have challenged each other through so much, but this might be the most necessary yet: to bend and admit what they need. That they need anything at all. 

There is a beat. Eggsy opens her eyes. Roxy is watching her with that look that Eggsy loves, chin pointed firmly and her eyes burning bright; says, “All right, then. It’s a deal.”

 

*

 

Eggsy gives the door a quick knock and pushes inside, saying, “You wanted to see me, Merl— ” She breaks off, shakes her head. “Sorry, Arthur, I'm still getting used to it.”

From his new desk, he gives her an amused look. “Merlin’s fine, Eggsy. I don't want the damn job, I'm just keeping the seat warm until we can agree on who comes next.”

As Eggsy takes a seat, he continues, taking his glasses off and methodically wiping them clean on his sweater, “I suppose that brings me to why I asked you to come, then.” Without his glasses, his eyes should look unfocused, but they’re as intent as ever, trained on Eggsy’s face. “While I’m in the job, I might as well...take care of some things so they can't overturn them afterward.” 

He’s wearing an odd, unreadable look that makes Eggsy sit up straighter, the back of her neck prickling. 

“You've been doing the work for some time now,” Merlin continues, “and you’ve put up with having to prove yourself well, but it's time to make it official, Galahad.” 

Eggsy’s stomach drops: literally plummets, the air leaving her lungs like she's been slapped clean across the face.

“ _No_ ,” she croaks, fingernails digging into the arms of her chair. 

“No?” Merlin says, very carefully. He looks wary, but unsurprised. 

“You can't,” Eggsy says, barely aware of what she's saying, too consumed with the need to make him _stop_. “You can't, I — give me something else, any other name. Not that one.”

“It's the one that's open,” Merlin says. “And it has to be filled.”

“Then _make one up_ , for all I give a shit,” Eggsy snarls, “and as far as I'm concerned it _is_ filled.”

Merlin sighs, a weary, bone-rattling sound that at any other time would make Eggsy crumble. 

“He'd want you to have it, Eggsy,” Merlin says, and the look in his eyes is unbearable, as are his next words: “He was proud of you.”

“Shut up,” Eggsy says, nearly panting with wild fury. The words spill out of her mouth without any thought; her mind is burned too clean of anything but her visceral abhorrence at the thought of taking that name, the memory of his disappointment draped over her shoulders like a mantle. She finds herself on her feet. “Shut up, what do you know — he weren't proud of me at all, what do _you_ know.” 

Something in the dismissive emphasis of that last query finally strikes through Merlin’s calm. His lips thin into a white, pressed line. When he speaks, Eggsy can hear the danger creeping into his voice. 

“What do _I_ know of Harry Hart?” Merlin says, slow and cold. 

Eggsy flinches, breathing hard. 

They don't say his name — no one does, only _Galahad_ this and _Galahad_ that. As if it's easier to speak of the title dying, and not the man who bore it. 

Shame pools in Eggsy’s stomach at speaking like this to Merlin — Harry's oldest friend, whose grief is etched into every line in his face; but if she faces his grief she will have to face her own, and she can't. The roaring anger in her veins is all she has left to cling to. 

Eggsy circles the desk, comes close enough for her feet to knock against Merlin’s. He’s sitting ramrod-straight in his chair like nothing can touch him, but when Eggsy looks in his eyes, she sees them burning like coals. 

“Shut up,” Eggsy whispers again, shaking. Merlin’s legs open wider as she takes a step forward, shins bumping the front of his chair. Her heart is pounding in her ears, as deafening as if she were underwater. Eggsy’s so close she could reach out and throttle him. 

She kisses him instead. 

Eggsy’s half-expecting to have to fight through a protest about her age, or their positions, or, god forbid, her state of mind; instead, Merlin stands in one sinuous motion, cups her hips in his broad hands and sits her on his desk, mouth on hers all the while. 

The relief of it, and the absence of the battle Eggsy had steeled herself for make her sag into Merlin’s hands, now spread warm over her back. She lets herself be kissed for a moment, so thoroughly she can't breathe, her mouth buzzing and tender. 

Inaction doesn't suit her for long: Eggsy hooks her ankles around Merlin’s thighs and drags him closer, nearly knocking Merlin’s glasses off as she grabs his head to kiss him deeper, wet and gasping. 

Merlin swears against her mouth, but manages to drag himself away after a moment. 

“Do _not_ break these, lass,” he warns her in a voice gone smoky and rough, adjusting his glasses over his ears. 

“Better take them off, then,” Eggsy returns smartly, giving him a heavy-lidded look that makes no promises. 

Merlin catches her chin between his fingers, and just _looks_ at her, for so long she feels the blood rise hot to her cheeks. 

“No,” Merlin says quietly. “I'm going to want to see this.”

Eggsy swallows. Then she scrambles to get her trousers and underwear off, hands shaking with want. Somehow she manages it, though she doesn't know how, with Merlin putting his hand in her hair and tugging her head to the side so he can get his mouth on the bared line of her neck. 

Merlin bites her, low on her throat where she can just about hide it, and Eggsy _moans_ , a high hurt sound she can't keep in even as she thinks about being heard outside the room. She’s so wet she aches, a low pulsing throb between her thighs. 

“Christ,” Merlin says, dark and reverent. He pushes Eggsy a little back on the desk and drags her by the thighs toward him, canting her hips upward. He doesn't even get undressed — just shoves everything down so he can get his cock out, fat and dripping wet at the tip. 

Eggsy clenches all over just from the sight of him, a wave of heat rolling down her body. She can feel the sweat in the bends of her knees, the small of her back; her shirt will be a ruin after this, and she doesn't know how she'll get out of his office without everyone knowing, and all of it just makes her pant harder with need, fingers white-knuckled on the edge of the desk. 

Merlin rolls on a condom, and then just — pushes into Eggsy, steady and relentless, giving her no time to breathe. His eyes are sharply focused on Eggsy’s face; she knows he'd stop at the slightest hint of discomfort, but she feels none: just a sweet stinging fullness, so good it punches another ragged moan out of her. The sound is so needy it nearly makes Eggsy blush; instead she wets her lips and digs her heels into Merlin’s back, says, “I can take it harder than _that_.”

The sound Merlin lets out is near-animal. He lifts Eggsy’s leg around his waist higher and _fucks_ her; fucks her so hard her arse skids on the desk and it's all she can do to hang on to his shoulders, nails digging in. 

Eggsy squeezes around Merlin’s cock again and again, winding herself up more each time. The slap of his skin on hers is a bright, stinging pleasure on her clit. She's going to come soon; she can feel it rising up in a wave inside her, waiting to swallow her whole. 

Merlin’s rhythm falters when he's close; Eggsy can see the muscle jump in his clenched jaw as he tries to hold himself back.

He puts his mouth to her ear, and his hand on her belly, sliding down. Says her name in a voice so raw Eggsy squirms in place, drowning. 

“Come on now, lass,” Merlin says, low and sweet, and oh she's nearly there, catching alight, and he says, “ _good_ girl — ”

Eggsy snaps: just breaks apart right there, tightening up so fast her thigh stings with a cramp, toes flexing. She thinks Merlin comes too, but she couldn't notice it or anything else for the world; the only thing she is capable of is clutching at him and crying out her climax in short, sobbing breaths — 

And then Eggsy is just sobbing, full-bodied and devastating, as if something stuck inside the heart of her has come loose. It wracks her from head to toe; it feels like it will never end. 

The world shifts beneath her, and resettles as she finds herself on Merlin’s chair, in his lap, head tucked against his shoulder. 

Eggsy catches her breath mid-tears, and dissolves again against the fabric of Merlin’s sweater and the weight of his hand cupping her head. God, it hurts, it _hurts_ , the pain and the guilt and even the anger she hasn't let herself feel; but even as it comes, she knows it for the relief it is, old rot inside her being scoured clean. 

Merlin is shaking too, she realizes; tremoring in his grief as he wraps himself around Eggsy, face buried in her hair like she’s keeping him afloat in turn. It's that that helps calm Eggsy, in fact: she isn't alone in this. She can be held, and hold him up as well. 

Eggsy’s tears slow eventually, leaving her with an aching throat and swollen, hot eyes. She clings to the front of Merlin’s sweater, not ready to look at him yet; but then, he doesn't seem particularly inclined to lift his head from her hair, either. 

“I could kill him for leaving us like this,” Merlin says at last, voice ragged with swallowed tears. “If he weren't already dead, I mean.”

Eggsy surprises herself by bursting into laughter, and thankfully manages to catch it before it devolves back into tears. 

“Yeah, I know,” she agrees, wiping her face on his sweater. “I miss him.” Closing her eyes, she says, “It's not the same without Harry Hart.”

It feels good to say his name again. 

Merlin exhales against her hair, and then presses a kiss into it. 

“No,” he agrees quietly. “But it's not the end of all things, either.” 

Eggsy lifts her head and finally sits back, looking up into Merlin’s face: as wrecked as she feels, as determined to pull himself together, one piece at a time. 

“The name's yours, lass,” Merlin says, tightening his arms around Eggsy. “I won't see anyone else have it.”

Eggsy waits for the flare of agony at the thought; instead, it’s a dull, distant throb, like probing a loose tooth. It might be the exhaustion, but she feels curiously purged. What had seemed before like an impossible weight, a chain of disappointment and failed expectations, now feels more like a chance. A calling. 

They’re a _mess_ ; still half-naked and sticky, tear-stained and rumpled, and Eggsy definitely doesn’t want to know where the condom might be now — but it’s the best she’s felt in a long, long time.

“All right,” Eggsy says at last, straightening up, shoulders going back. “Let’s hear it, then.”

Merlin leans forward and puts his mouth back to her ear. “Time to get back to work,” Merlin says, quiet and warm. “Galahad.”


End file.
